The UK foot-and-mouth disease outbreak - the aftermath

The 2001 epidemic of foot-and-mouth disease in the United Kingdom triggered a livestock culling campaign that involved the slaughter of more than 6.5 million animals. Three years later, management of the epidemic remains controversial. Some believe that untried control methods based on unvalidated models replaced well-established policy, motivating an unnecessary slaughter. Others hold that rigorous quantitative approaches provided the basis for new incisive policies that significantly curtailed the epidemic. Now, new and more flexible control policies have been adopted throughout Europe. For these policies to receive the full confidence of scientists, veterinarians and the general public, it is necessary that we improve both our understanding of where, how and why control measures initially failed in 2001 and how new policies should be implemented.